Diaries of a former Le Cordon Bleu Paris Student.

Food - General

September 07, 2009

Although they've died down recently, I get emails asking me about various things from cuts of meat to restaurant recommendations in cities I've lived in. The most popular themes, though, are about Le Cordon Bleu, Paris and what I've done with myself since.

A lot of people write when they have questions or doubts about going to the school, about its curriculum, about housing, about whether or not it's worth the (substantial) monetary investment. The remaining people ask what kinds of positions are available in the food industry to graduates, with some thinking about restaurant jobs but more often than not, what else is out there.

It's been something I've struggled with for the past 3 years since graduation. My one-week stint at a Parisian restaurant assured me that I was not cut out for restaurant work, at least behind the line. As much as I was fascinated with the whole process and loved the adrenaline rush, the usually low pay and rough hours were discouraging. Not to mention potentially having personal relationships suffer if you have such different work lifestyles.

So what CAN you do? I was lucky that my timing worked well and I got into America's Test Kitchen as an intern. The application process was not difficult, so the tougher aspect was dealing with working full-time for 3 months unpaid. The whole experience, not to mention the notoriety that it has, was totally worth it. I learned a ton on testing professionally, I had 8 hours a day of a wide variety of pure cooking that really honed my skills more than cooking school ever could, and I was dealing with a great group of people who taught me a lot. It wasn't difficult decision to stay on after my internship to see if staff positions opened up, which also helped me to get asked to help with their TV show taping, valuable and rare experience.

When the stars didn't align for open positions, I was a little lost. My whole time in Boston during the internship, I had been teaching at a children's cooking school. I ramped up my hours, got more involved in planning menus for the school year and for summer, and threw all my energy in there.

Then I walked into Stir in Boston, fell in love with the cookbooks and what they do, and asked for a job on the spot. It's really true that in the food industry, if you see something you want to be involved in, you just ask. It's not as formal and you just have to be gutsy and passionate about it. They hired me and I got experience in fine dining / guest services, a little management, and the world of cookbook buying. More experience in things I never thought I'd be doing.

Fast forward to last year, and I moved back to San Francisco with a vague idea that I would consult with menu and recipe planning, hoping that I'd find more to do. The work was there, but not in the volume I had hoped for. Another chapter in 3 years of no to low pay, and sometimes no clear career path.

But the persistence has finally paid off. I cold-called for food positions out here, including for catering companies and a school lunch program, but nothing hit. I almost decided to see if I could find something back in advertising, what I did before picking up the knife kit.

Then it happened - a position that I'm ecstatic about: full-time, with benefits, normal hours - there are so few of these in the food industry! I'm joining the test kitchen at Chow.com next week, cooking with their small group, doing some editorial work, and basically combining a lot of skills I've picked up over the years into one job, plus picking up a few new ones like food styling and prop/grocery shopping. I'm thrilled that I'm not leaving the kitchen.

It feels great and exciting - the team seems vibrant, interesting, and passionate. Looking back, all the jobs I've chosen helped me be the candidate they were seeking. It was a hard and bumpy road, and not everyone has the patience or support from family and friends that I had. But there is hope! Big lesson I learned: take jobs you really are interested in. Only then can you learn and grow, hopefully taking you along a path that ends in where you want to be.

August 07, 2009

While my favorite crabs are definitely Dungeness, soft-shell crabs come in a close second. In fact, I believe I had a small addiction when living in Boston. Unfortunately, they are more of an East Coast delicacy and I didn't expect to see them much here. But as luck would have it, the Berkeley Bowl had them a few weeks ago, and live!

They were on the smallish side, so we bought 4, two for the each of us. Here they are all lined up to be cleaned. It's always best to get them live and to clean them yourself for freshness, but if you are using them immediately, sometimes your fishmonger will do it for you.

To clean them, first you flip them over and pull the tab at the bottom (called the apron) out. Cut off with a pair of scissors.

Then you flip them back over and cut off the face. While it sounds gruesome, it needs to be done. Then gently lift up one side of the shell and you'll see the lungs, which are long and stringy. Cut off and repeat on the other side of the shell.

Rinse and dry thoroughly with paper towels, and your crabs are ready to be cooked!

My favorite cooking method is to fry them until crispy, served on a soft bun with tartar sauce and juicy ripe summer tomato slices. However, a salad is also a great accompaniment, as the crab is rich and juicy but begging for some acidity.

Soak in milk, then dredge them in a mixture of flour and cornmeal (for crunch). Fry in a nonstick pan - easy cleanup and less likelihood of the flour coming off and burning on the bottom of the pan. You can't be stingy with the oil here or your crab won't be crisp!

That night, we served our crabs with a green salad and fresh corn pancakes. Summer on a plate!

Place milk in a shallow bowl and place crabs in the milk while you prepare the rest of the ingredients.

Combine flour and cornmeal in another shallow bowl. Season heavily with salt and pepper.

Heat vegetable oil and butter in a nonstick saucepan over medium-high heat until shimmering. Dip one crab in flour mixture and coat on both sides, pressing to make a thick crust. Immediately place in hot oil and repeat with other crabs.

Cook 2 - 3 minutes on each side until crispy and golden brown. Place crabs on paper-towel lined dish to drain. Serve immediately

July 28, 2009

More sweet than tart, covered in a beautiful blue skin, blueberries are packed full of antioxidants. Fortunately, they are addictingly tasty too! Blueberries have started appearing at the farmer's markets here in San Francisco within the last month and are plump and juicy. It's been a lot of fun to snack on them or to figure out what recipes they can go into.

For pancakes and during the winter, we prefer the little ones from Maine - no bigger than a small pea but with little bursts of flavor and sweetness. For snacking out of hand, the bigger the better! When challenged to come up with a recipe featuring blueberries for the U.S. Highbush Blueberry Council, I had a lot of fun (as did my impromptu tasters) coming up with a recipe that was just as delicious for breakfast as it is for tea or for dessert. Best of all, it combines two great ingredients: blueberries and brown butter.

Brown butter is one of those fun mysteries because of the transformation in flavor that it goes through. I've only started to play around with brown butter in my baking; previously, I mainly used it in French recipes like sole meunière.

For my cake, you start with browning 10 Tablespoons of butter. Some things learned along the way: brown the butter in a regular skillet, as you can see the browning action and know when to stop much easier than in a dark nonstick pan. Another is to brown slowly and gently while keeping a close eye on it, as you have to remember that it continues to brown even after you take it off the heat. Lastly, immediately scrape the brown butter into another container, or else the solids which contain all the flavor stick to the bottom of the pan and don't end up in your cake batter! (Don't listen to the people who tell you to strain it!)

Next up was a streusel topping. As much as I love a thick, crumbly layer of streusel on top of a cake, I kept it to a thin layer so that it didn't overwhelm the blueberries in the cake.

This is one of the cakes that has multiple parts but only takes a few minutes to actually mix together. It's quite a thick batter, so you don't really have to worry about the blueberries sinking. You can just fold them in gently at the end and they distribute themselves quite nicely. I like the tiny Maine blueberries in this cake, but of course, go with what's fresh and what you like. If you can't get fresh ones, don't be afraid of frozen ones, as they work just as well and are just as nutritious. You don't even have to defrost them, just fold them right in.

And the delicious result? You decide:

A crisp, crackly top covers a thick, moist cake studded with blueberries. The brown butter adds a subtle nutty accent and more depth of flavor, the milk keeps the cake tender, and you get hits of sweetness from the swirls of blueberries. Trust me, it's hard to wait until this cake has cooled before diving in. We've had it for breakfast, for dessert, and even by stolen forkfuls throughout the day when we thought no one was looking. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter a 9-inch cake pan or springform pan and dust with flour, set aside.

Brown the butter: melt in a medium skillet over medium heat and cook it until the butter browns and smells nutty (about 5 - 7 minutes). Swirl the pan occasionally to move the solids around, and you are looking for the solids at the bottom of the pan to turn a golden brown color.Remove from the flame, scrape into a heatproof bowl and let cool.

Combine flour, brown sugar, cinnamon and salt for streusel topping in a medium bowl.Add butter pieces and rub butter pieces between fingers until topping pieces are about the size of large peas (or you can use a pastry cutter).Set aside.

For cake, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in bowl of standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment.In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, and vanilla extract.

Turn mixer on to low.Slowly pour in egg mixture and mix until all dry ingredients are just moistened.

Slowly pour in cooled browned butter and beat over medium speed until smooth.Remove bowl from mixer and gently fold in blueberries by hand with a plastic spatula.

Pour into prepared pan. Sprinkle with streusel topping and bake until the cake is golden brown and springs back to the touch, about 35 – 40 minutes, or a tester comes out clean.Let cool at least 20 minutes before serving.

July 23, 2009

Ordering a wedding cake always seemed like it would be the fun part of putting together a wedding. I mean, you get to taste cakes, frosting, and fillings, right? What could go wrong?

When H & I were planning our wedding, we had lightly tossed the idea around of a "fake" wedding cake. Our caterer was known for her lavish dessert buffets, and we felt that most people don't remember the cake anyway. In fact, we had made a 3-tiered fake wedding cake for my sister last year that fooled everyone (she served cupcakes and had a chocolate fountain instead). When we got engaged, we received more than one "Are you guys going to make your wedding cake?" (Answer: NO!)

Because we knew we would have a lot of desserts, we opted for a small wedding cake to give people a small taste that would go well with our other selections. Small cakes look more delicate and less overwhelming, and we cared much more about design than size.

Then came the difficulties: what should it look like, and who would make it?

Since we met in Paris, we had hoped for a few French elements in the ceremony and food, and my eyes landed on the Pierre Hermé bags that I had squirreled away every time we went for macarons: "How about a macaron cake?" (Yes, they are so over-hyped nowadays, but I like to think that I became fascinated with them well before the current craze.)

I snapped a few photos of the bag for inspiration and started calling cake designers. And the fun began. "We don't do cakes that small." "Oh, we don't do tastings for cakes that small, you'll just have to pick the flavors." "We don't deliver cakes that small, but we can send a courier." "Well, I GUESS I could do a sketch for you." "Give me an email or a call in a few weeks for a design." "Our cake person only comes in on weekdays."

It seemed like nobody wanted our business. I was close to just picking a place that wasn't that friendly but begrudgingly said they could do our cake, until my maid-of-honor (who works for Brides magazine in NYC) suggested Studio Cake, which is conveniently located near H's workplace.

My first email was quickly answered and I fell in love with her website and designs. They had even recently been featured on Martha Stewart. Nothing frilly or old-fashioned, but not too wacky either. Just delicate, classy, carefully crafted cakes that were each unique yet showed a lot uniformity in technique and professionalism.

BethAnn set up the first meeting to talk about concepts and to get a general sense of who we were and what we wanted our wedding to be like. To our surprise, she sent us home with a box full of cake tastings! This was even before we signed on, relieving us of the pressure of signing a contract just to taste the cakes. She was relaxed, fun, and truly wanted to know our ideas.

Our colors were silver and blue, but we knew that the signature Pierre Hermé orange had to be somewhere. The delicate leaf cut-outs on the bag also sparked her imagination, and she told us that she would send some sketches along for us to get the ball rolling.

I love sketches. I love being a part of the process. Below is her sketch, and we ended up choosing the bottom one. This is one of my treasured souvenirs from the wedding planning process:

After a second cake tasting (we must be gluttons), we decided on a ginger cake with passion fruit buttercream. Light, airy, and a bright burst of fruit. Studio Cake never freezes their cakes and makes them all from scratch - what more can you ask for? She also provides cake stands or cake boards if you need them.

I also secretly commissioned her to make a groom's cake, which became the hit of the evening. The Red Sox fan in my life couldn't believe his eyes, and the children pleaded, "You can't cut it!" But cut it we did, marveling at how realistic it was and how fun the cakeboard decorated like a base was.

Some things are just meant to be. If you turn the Pierre Hermé logo upside down, you get our initials, H & C. When BethAnn shrewdly discovered that, we secretly patted ourselves on our backs at how awesome she was.

Last but not least, I searched high and low for the perfect macarons. Shipping them from France was out of the question, but luckily, Paulette Macarons had just opened in Hayes Valley. After pestering them about their spring flavors, we lucked out with the exact color we wanted, bright orange macarons that had just come out for the season. And guess what, they were passion-fruit flavored! Sometimes the stars align just for you and you feel blessed. I love the little silver dots that she put between the macarons that just added a little more subtle sparkle.

Our finished cake was breathtaking, especially with the cake table accented by our florist I only got a bite of cake that night, but we froze the top layer and are currently enjoying it (we did save a chunk for our anniversary, don't worry!). We were lucky to have Studio Cake & BethAnn as one of our vendors and wouldn't have had it any other way.

July 16, 2009

A Thursday in San Francisco means the new Thursday Farmers' Market at the Ferry Building, 10-2. If you can, you should go earlier before the lunch crowd takes over. A few produce stands like Lucero & Dirty Girl, with lots of tomatoes and peaches right now. Please pardon the amateurish-iPhone pics.

Namu's Korean BBQ Beef Tacos: toasted seaweed, rice, Korean beef, kimchi, and some kind of addictive special sauce. $2.25/1, $4/2. They are amazing, could have been a little warmer though.

Pizza Politana's Margherita Pizza, $8: Very thin, crispy crust with loads of flavor. Made to order in a portable wood-burning oven!

The beef sandwiches from Roli Roti, $6 looked good. Will have to try next week. Roasted potatoes are also available there, but no chicken, porchetta, or lamb. Mexican place called Tacolicious, and some intense sorbets from Scream Sorbet.

And of course, the "only in San Francisco" picture of the day belongs to the guy who parks his pets in Union Square. Yes, it's a cat with a white rat sitting on top of a dog. They all seem to get along!

In the quest for good cocktail bars here in San Francisco, we finally stumbled upon The Alembic Bar on Haight. Never mind that it was only 2 in the afternoon, the bar was full and we were in the good hands of the friendly staff there.

Food here is California cuisine meets comfort food: pork belly sliders, mussels with chorizo, pickled quail eggs, and balanced cocktails to match. Trust me, we'll be back. And the great photos are courtesy of H, playing with his new camera! Hopefully I'll learn how to use it and my pictures will improve.